Sentencing & the death penalty

"Every week we hear of a brutal murder, rape or stabbing, far too often perpetrated by someone who should not be in our country to begin with. Does the Prime Minister agree that, for cases in which the guilt is so undeniable, the crime so monstrous and the evil so irredeemable, the reintroduction of the death penalty for both foreign and domestic criminals should be put to the British people in a legally binding referendum?"

"Reintroducing the death penalty is not the answer to this. It did not work when it was in place. It led to the death of people who, it turned out, were in fact innocent. What we must do, as we are doing, is improve the criminal justice response in this country."

• "Hold a Binding Referendum on Restoring the Death Penalty", arguing that "a considerable majority of the country supports the death penalty for certain crimes" and citing a cost of "over £55,000 per year" for "a prison cell for a murderer".
• "Strict sentences for anyone caught carrying a knife" — Mr Lowe has separately asked the government, in a written question answered 18 June 2025, to introduce a minimum five-year sentence for adults convicted of carrying a knife.
• "Women should be permitted to carry and use pepper spray – a tool used by the police themselves – to defend against attackers."
• On a referendum itself, Mr Lowe has said Restore Britain members would be "free to campaign how they choose".

Beyond the referendum call, Mr Lowe's written parliamentary questions on sentencing include:

• a review of sentencing guidelines for grooming-gang offences (answered 22 January 2025);
• sentences handed down for offensive social-media posts (answered 29 January 2025);
• the proportion of imprisoned sex offenders who are foreign nationals (answered 30 July 2025);
• average custodial sentences for Islamist terrorism offences (answered 16 July 2025).

His full question and voting record is linked from the profile page.

• The Murder (Abolition of Death Penalty) Act 1965 suspended capital punishment for murder; Parliament made abolition permanent in December 1969, and Northern Ireland followed in 1973.
• The Crime and Disorder Act 1998 abolished the death penalty for the last remaining offences — treason and piracy with violence.
• The Human Rights Act 1998 gives Convention rights direct effect in UK law.

• The UK ratified ECHR Protocol 13 on 10 October 2003; it came into force for the UK on 1 February 2004 and abolishes the death penalty in all circumstances, including wartime.
• Protocol 13 permits no derogations and no reservations. Reintroducing capital punishment while remaining a party to it is not legally possible.
• Leaving would mean denouncing the Convention framework — ECHR Article 58 requires six months' notice — plus repeal or amendment of the Human Rights Act and new primary legislation creating the offence-and-penalty framework.

• Henry Nowak, an 18-year-old University of Southampton student, was stabbed five times on Belmont Road, Portswood, late on 3 December 2025.
• Police bodycam footage released on 2 June 2026 showed officers handcuffing the fatally wounded Nowak as he said he had been stabbed and could not breathe.
• Vickrum Singh Digwa, 23, was convicted of murder on 28 May 2026 and sentenced to life with a minimum term of 21 years. His mother was later convicted of assisting an offender.
• The House of Lords debated the case on 3 June 2026, and the police handling is under Independent Office for Police Conduct investigation.

After the conviction, Mr Lowe posted that "a Restore Britain Government, with the British people's approval, would put Vickrum Digwa to death", repeated the binding-referendum pledge, and said "we need prosecutions for what happened to Henry Nowak" over the police response.

He also tabled at least ten written questions to the Home Office — answered 11 June 2026 — covering the arrest decision, bodycam and radio evidence, the scope of the IOPC investigation, and the treatment of the victim's family.